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Hey Jude, Lucio’s in the Village with Style
By Karen Rempel Bill Cunningham once said, “It’s not style unless it’s on the street.” The West Village is a glorious neighborhood for people-watching, as many of our neighbors and visitors are likely to be dressed in the unique style that makes New York such a fun place to live. On a recent sunny day,
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Ethnic Pride Portraits
Portraits of people around the world proud of their heritage, showing ethnic and religious pride wearing traditional folk regalia and costumes. Below: Greek, Korean, Native American, Hindu, Chinese and American African Muslim. Other examples can be found on my website www.joelgordon.com. Photo credit © Joel Gordon 2019—All rights reserved.
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A Child’s Stay in the Middle East
By Carol Yost In the early fall of 1955, when I had just turned 10, my family went to Syria on a grant under a 1948 law called the Smith-Mundt Act, or the U. S. Information and Educational Exchange Act. It was designated “an act to promote the better understanding of the United States among
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Osteria 57 Flavors West Village with Mouth-Popping Italian Pescatarian Fusion
By Karen Rempel Osteria 57 has been lighting up West 10th Street with tiny fairy lights for a year and a half, and delighting our mouthbuds with intricate flavors constructed from the earth and sea. I’ve enjoyed many meals and special occasions at owner and host Emanuele’s Sardinian masterpiece of hospitality and epicurean adventures. Last
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Hunting for Treasures at Home
By Annette Benda Fox, Fox Gallery NYC Spring cleaning can be an adventure of discovery! What if your grandmother’s teapot is worth $500 or even $50,000? We have all been surprised by discoveries like that on Antiques Roadshow. Maybe it’s time to find out if you have hidden treasure. Perhaps you need funds or more
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Maggie B’s Quick Clicks
LAST CALL When the show opened last November, New York Times Art Critic Holland Cotter urged “MEET WARHOL, AGAIN, IN THIS BRILLIANT WHITNEY SHOW,” adding “the sweeping retrospective shows a personal side of the Pop master … and reasserts his power for a new generation.” And in the February 15th Times Weekend section, in a
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West Village Original: Marshall W. Mason
By Michael D. Minichiello This month’s West Village Original is director Marshall W. Mason, born in Amarillo, Texas in 1940. Mason co-founded the Circle Repertory Company in New York and was artistic director for 18 years. He directed such plays as The Hot L Baltimore, Fifth of July, Talley’s Folly, As Is, and Burn This. Nominated five
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Theater Book Review: The Transcendent Years
By Robert Heide The title of Marshall W. Mason’s remarkable new book entitled The Transcendent Years—The Circle Repertory Company & The 1960s for which he was the artistic director for eighteen years is his homage to Harold Clurman’s Group Theater book The Fervent Years. Marshall Mason won a special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement and
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Seniors Doing Cat Cows
By Stanley Wlodyka Jean-Michel Basquiat couldn’t cut it in a traditional high school setting. After dropping out, the Brooklyn native enrolled at City-As-School, a continuation school in the West Village. At this institution, students up to the age of 22 can earn their diploma going to class on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, while interning
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Jim Fouratt’s Reel Deal: Movies that Matter
As I write this I am into day two of the Sundance Film Festival in Park City Utah. I have been coming to Sundance since the early ’90s. It is my favorite film festival in the world. Yes, we are fortunate to have had in New York City two major film festivals—the much loved and
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The Motivation for Political Paintings
By Phil Levine When I turned 40 years old (34 years ago) and living in Denver, I had this conversation with myself. “Philip, you think you’ve been given the gifts of music and art but you haven’t yet opened those gifts.” From that day on I committed myself to doing just that and began taking
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West Village Images by Joel Gordon: Art Illusions and Fantasies
Photographic series of digital computer art, illusions or fantasy featuring close up details taken from architecture and design elements of buildings. Other examples can be found on my website www.joelgordon.com. Photo credit © Joel Gordon 2019—All rights reserved.
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A Sad Farewell to Beloved Cornelia Street Café
by Karen Rempel On January 1, 2019, hundreds of patrons and performers from every decade of the Cornelia Street Café’s 41 years of creative explosion gathered for a final burst of celebration and communion. Many took the stage on the final evening, including the luminary award-winning recording artist Suzanne Vega. She sang “Tom’s Diner,” which
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Everything Old Is New Again on Bleecker St.
By Gordon T. Hughes Peter Allen co-wrote a song titled “Everything Old Is New Again.” The song was a hit and used in a show which made it to Broadway when Hugh Jackman played Peter Allen in The Boy from Oz. But let me get to the subject at hand, Bleecker Street. I have lived
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The Michael Smith Book
By Robert Heide Michael Smith, who for many years wrote a column for the Village Voice called Theatre Journal and was chief drama critic at that now shuttered newspaper, has written a detailed account of his life as a man of many guises, editor, writer, playwright, poet, director, mayoral aide, musician, and publisher of Fast
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Uprooted
By Mitchell Donian I have been uprooted. After living in Greenwich Village for sixty years I am homeless. In an effort to regain a place in the community my good friend and publisher George Capsis of WestView News suggested I write my story with some biographical detail. I had a rent controlled apartment, was being
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Eating the Brand
By David Porat Lexus, Starbucks and Restoration Hardware (RH) are all trying to make friends by tickling your taste buds and satiating your tummy. All three have opened up impressive, or shall I say grand, temples to their brands in the Meatpacking and Chelsea Market Neighborhood. I have enjoyed in curious ways visiting all three and
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Jonas Mekas Was Frozen History
By George Capsis 66 years ago I was invited by Dick Brummer to his top floor apartment on Perry Street for an small evening party and I found myself glancing down from the rear window at a garden across the way on Charles Street that became the house I bought for my family and in
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Jim Fouratt’s REEL DEAL: Movies That Matter
Best in Film 2018 I spent a lot of time watching movies this year, just as I did in the streets protesting! I see my role as a critic as sharing with you those creative works which made me feel human, helped me identify with the feelings of others and inspired me to have hope.
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Visions of Vija: A Villager’s Journey
By Stanley Wlodyka Almost 90 years ago, Vija Vetra peeked through a hole in the wall of a dance studio where ballet classes were taught. Who knows which adolescent boy had carved out the peephole, looking to stoke the fire kindled by adolescent hormones, watching the girls plié and rond de jambe their way into
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Mickey: The True Original Exhibition—An Immersive Experience
By Robert Heide As you approach the building at 60 Tenth Avenue between West 14th and 15th Streets in the Northwest corner of Greenwich Village you see a series of old style 1930s super huge painted Mickey’s in his red shorts and big yellow shoes in a variety of poses and facial expressions, wearing sometimes
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Bird of the Year 2018
By Keith Michael As the National Audubon Society wraps up this Year of the Bird 2018—bringing international attention to the plight of countless bird species and the effects of climate change for us all—it is time, once again, here in the West Village, to celebrate our local ecosystem with the 13th Annual Bird of the
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Integral Yoga Natural Foods Closes Doors After 45 Years
By Sarah Dowson Recently hundreds of loyal natural-foods patrons were shocked and heartbroken to learn that Integral Yoga Natural Foods (“IYNF”), at 229 West 13th Street, had closed because of overwhelming competition in the changing retail landscape. IYNF sold organic fruits and vegetables, prepared foods, freshly juiced vegetables, as well as flour, grains, and spices
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Integral Yoga Natural Foods: Some Memories
Having finished my organic red kale the other day, I ambled over to Integral Yoga Natural Foods (“IYNF”) at 227 West 13th St. with the intention of buying another bunch to munch and maybe a few spices too. I felt devastated to see a sign on their door announced they were closing due to “overwhelming
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Robot Travel
By George Capsis Michael Usyk had a show of his artwork in Paris which he attended via Skype—his image displayed on a laptop on a table in the middle of the show. Visitors to the exhibit (if they spoke English) could chat with Michael about his work as he sat in his little apartment in the West Village. Well, this
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Remembrances of The Lost Village: Cornelia Street Café
By Roger Paradiso I remember the Fourth of July festival on Cornelia Street a few years back. Robin Hirsch of the Cornelia Street Café was throwing his annual birthday celebration for his landmark jazz/comedy/poetry club. (To this date as I write this in 2018, he is celebrating his 41st year in business. Number 42 would
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Film Explores Diversity from the Inside Out
A recent study by Business Insider—called by some the largest business news site on the internet—identified the ten most serious problems according to millennials. They include: lack of economic opportunity; safety, security and general wellbeing; education; food and water security; government accountability and transparency; poverty; inequality in terms of income as well as race and
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Holiday Decorations in the West Village
West Village Images by Joel Gordon Other examples can be found on my website www.joelgordon.com. Photo credit © Joel Gordon 2018—All rights reserved.
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The Great Whitney Warhol Show
By Robert Heide The title for the spectacular new Whitney art show is simply Andy Warhol From A to B and Back Again. The chief curator of the show is Donna De Salvo who has assembled a fully comprehensive Warhol art retrospective of more than 350 of his world famous Pop Art originals. Warhol had been turning
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Goodnight Irene, I’ll See You in My Dreams
The Death of Maria Irene Fornes, Genius Greenwich Village Playwright—1930-2018 By John Gilman Maria Irene Fornes, known to her friends and peers as just Irene Fornes, was unpretentious and fun loving, but at heart a serious playwright. For many years Irene lived in a loft-sized apartment filled with books stacked to the ceiling as well
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“The Lost Village” Exposes The Evil Takeover of Greenwich Village by NYU and Large Corporations
By Carol Yost The Lost Village is our very own Greenwich Village: Roger Paradiso’s film chronicles how greed and lust for power have transformed the original, unique character of the Village. (NOTE: This is a revised review after last year’s screening. Now the film is in distribution, and I saw it for the second time
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Remembrances from The Lost Village: Death of The Living Theater
By Roger Paradiso If there is one interview that haunts me from my film The Lost Village it was the one with Judith Malina. Judith and Julian Beck met when she was 17. In 1947 they formed The Living Theater, which was a part of the Village scene in the 1950s and 60s until they
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Autograph Hound
By Alan Perna I was standing on 6th Avenue and 48th Street in front of a rehearsal studio, when I saw a taxi go by. I started running after it. I ran three blocks until it stopped at a light. My mind was racing, my heart pounding, my mouth was dry. I grabbed the door
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Not “The Duck”
By Keith Michael I throw a (small) handful of kibble across the floor. Millie takes up her cue to hit the boards for her famed “corgi kibble dance.” The Prelude: Two rapid spins. Act I: Pick up only one kibble, toss it in the air, pursue (into a far corner if necessary). Act II: Methodically
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Kennedy: Bobby’s Last Crusade, Theatre At St. Clement’s
By Eric Uhlfelder A play remembering the 1968 presidential campaign, how the country has changed and how it hasn’t. Wandering several blocks west of Times Square to an old church might seem an odd place to find a tale about a presidential campaign fifty years on. But this choice of venue to host an escape
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Movie Review: THE LOST VILLAGE
By Bennett Kremen The Lost Village is an alarming documentary that uses engaging interviews and strong visuals to show us the slow death of that unique treasure called Greenwich Village. You’d have to be deaf and blind not to notice that dismayed Villagers everywhere are profoundly baffled by a cancerous disease known as hyper-gentrification. The film is not a nostalgic historic rendering of the Village
